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Oct 8 09 5:42 PM
Official JMMB Twitter Master
My wife and I are heading to London Thursday night. The impetus for the trip was in invitation from Fox to attend the London Film Festival premiere of Wes Anderson's The Fantastic Mr. Fox. The pitch, as I don't go on many of these trips, was that this would be the one and only opportunity to see the entire voice cast (Clooney, Steep, Murray, etc) together.
Even for that, a 10 hour plane flight just to see a movie and talk to the team - even that team - seemed a bit nutty. But we decided that a week in London, right before my wife is grounded for the duration of her pregnancy, was a nice idea. So we took the generous offer of airfare for me and a couple of hotel nights from the studio and I am paying for the rest of the nights, my wife's airfare, and whatever other costs are involved aside from the day trip to Roald Dahl's home (another big draw for me) and the festival tickets.
It's interesting that just before we go, there is this drama about "bloggers" and the FTC. Of course, any sane reading of the FTC's interest in this issue is about people who are getting computers and cars - Do you know how the car magazines choose their year's bests? I do... and it's ugly! - and iPhone-level toys. This notion that some out there have been kicking around that there is any quid pro quo expected when it comes to DVD release screeners is idiotic. The only thing studios get out of sending journalists promotional items is chatter - not always positive - about the promo items themselves.
James Rocchi wrote one of those "behind the scenes of the junket I am covering" pieces for MSN re: Couples Retreat's Tahiti junket. It brings up an interesting issue in that going on that junket is not really a choice that James or others can made.
I stopped going to all but one or two studio junkets a year because I am free to make that choice. On a movie like Couple's Retreat - assuming its general quality level from others, having not seen it - I have been known to pass on interviews, much less a trip to do them, after seeing a film. I passed on a few very high profile interviews in Toronto because i just couldn't smile my way through the conversation in order to score those actors for DP/30.
But I don't have an employer breathing down my neck to deliver page views or the kind of stuff they want to see in the paper or website. A part of James' annual income is based on going to junkets and talking to whatever big celebrity is there. And not liking the movie is not really an issue that the writer is allowed to indulge loudly. James: Junket Dude is not there to review the film. He's there to deliver content for MSN. And when James: The Critic does someday review the film, I am confident that he will speak his mind freely.
This doesn't mean that many writers - not just online, but in print and God knows, TV - do not assume the quid pro quo of it all without the studio saying a word... and not just for Tahiti junkets, but in any situation in which they can lay down for the studio and the talent and give it all up on cue. And again, in many case... That Is The Job.
A guy like Pete Hammond will tell you what he thinks privately... but it is his job through the awards season to be nice to everyone because his primary income comes from being paid nightly - often multiple times in the same night - to publicly interview the talent from these films. Pissing on the films in public just won't fly. He is doing his job.
If you know that any host on ET or Access or E! dislikes a film, they are NOT doing their job.
Anyway... I have never been shy about being 100% transparent about when studios pay for stuff. When I was with roughcut.com, a Time-Warner business, we took everything we could get... back when internet wasn't given much of anything. I did some set visits... but they were rarely worth much. (The last one was in 2005 for V for Vendetta.) When we started MCN, I was already dropping off the junket lists. I think the last time I took anything from a studio in connection to covering a movie was a 2 day trip to Lake Tahoe to talk to Joe Carnahan about Smokin' Aces. The studio couldn't have been nicer, I still am a Joe fan, and I realized that I had no business on those trips. I don't have a problem with those who go on them... but not my thing.
But you know... I'm very lucky. None of our writers or features on MCN are junket-driven, primarily because junkets are covered so extensively by so many other outlets. Why would we spend the man/woman hours duplicating that stuff?
The only travel I ever really accept is from a few film festivals each year. I am an active adviser to the Bermuda Film Festival and haven't really covered the festival as a festival in years. Seattle is a regular stop, but for years now, I have hosted an event or been on the jury, singing for my supper, as Anne Thompson says. (I even paid for extra room nights this year... willingly. Things are tough in FestWorld there these days.) San Francisco is usually good for a few hotel room nights and I usually pay for a number of extra days there. I may do 10-15 days a year at other fests that pay airfare and hotel, though I have done less and less of that. I spend a lot more covering fests than is ever paid for by fests.
Obviously, I get screeners during the award season and I get Blu-rays from all the studios, but most consistently from Sony and Disney. I am much more interested in covering Blu from the big picture perspective than from the individual films and you would be seeing a lot more content from each disc I get if the publicists who handle these companies had their druthers. But the wise folks at the two studios that send almost every title understand that they are feeding my Blu coverage, which is rare amongst writers who are not strictly reviewing Home Ent content. I don't get DVDs that aren't Blu-ray because that's not really the point. (Actually, some smaller companies send me stuff... but probably shouldn't. It rarely gets seen. I just don't have the time.)
Anyway... now you know what I take. I don't consider it breaking any rules. I don't think anyone can connect any review or coverage I have done across a career online of over a decade to any junket or "sample" in which I have ever indulged. Mostly this is because for years now, when I cover anything, it is because I have an interest, not because I am rolling along with the machinery. But again... I am very fortunate to be able to afford not to do things that don't interest me.
Onward... http://www.mcnblogs.com/thehotblog/archives/2009/10/heading_to_lond.html
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